BULLS 85, HORNETS 77 (box)
CHICAGO | The game started under the spectre of a dual hangover. The Bulls were coming off their most emotional win of the season, a one-point thriller on Sunday that gave them three victories in three tries (by a total of eight points) against the vaunted Miami Heat this season. After Dwyane Wade's bid for a game-winning shot came up short, ABC's cameras captured stoic Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau in a rigorous fist pump, which of course became a topic during Thibodeau's pregame presser. Never one to vent his spleen, Thibodeau offered the following explanation:

"I don't worry about that kind of stuff," Thibodeau said, with a hint of scoff in his voice.

Meanwhile, the Hornets won at Cleveland on Sunday. That in itself doesn't seem like much, but New Orleans lost Chris Paul in a nasty collision in the game. The Hornets recovered to go on a run and hold off the Cavs, but Paul's status going forward is an open question, potentially a fatal blow to the hopes of a borderline playoff team. Paul was with the team at the United Center for the game, but he looked anything but coherent as he walked down the hall with a team trainer with fuzzy eyes. Jarrett Jack took his place in the starting lineup.

Paul's injury took some of the luster off what would have been a dynamite matchup between him and Chicago's Derrick Rose. Instead, the questions were two-fold: Would Chicago suffer a letdown coming off the big win and a 4-1 road trip? How would New Orleans compensate for Paul's absence, if such a thing could even be accomplished? New Orleans entered the game 12.6 points per 100 possessions worse when Paul was off the floor. That's a lot of ground to make up.

Before the game, Hornets coach Monty Williams said Jack would play heavy minutes, with Willie Green spotting him at point from time to time. Perhaps recognizing that "heavy minutes" mean a long night for the guy assigned to chase around Rose, Williams had his charges in a 2-3 zone for much of the first quarter, to little positive effect. The Hornets' chance might have been to jump on a travel-weary, emotionally-drained Bulls squad early, but New Orleans had travel woes of their own and player availability issues (starting forward Trevor Ariza was also out). The teams slogged through the first three sleepy quarters more or less even-steven.

At that point, Thibodeau made what turned out to be the key decision of the game. Instead of sitting Rose for his customary breather at the beginning of the fourth quarter, he left his star on the floor. It turned out to be a master stroke, as Rose caught fire and the Bulls pushed their lead to 10 points--the biggest advantage either team enjoyed in the game. The decision to leave the NBA's leading MVP candidate on the floor might not seem like a big deal. However, Thibodeau is fairly religious in his rotation of players and the Bulls were coming off a back-to-back. The decision to push Rose was far from a no-brainer. Afterward, Thibodeau explained his decision to leave Rose, who logged a Bulls-high 41 minutes in the game, on the floor.

"At the end of third, I thought he got going a little bit and he had a rhythm and we wanted to ride that," Thibodeau said. "So we went with he and C.J. (Watson) together. We were just trying to put a little more energy into the game. We probably played (Rose) a little longer than we wanted to, but it's because we felt like he was getting the hot hand."

Down the stretch, the Bulls hit another offensive drought, but held on thanks to their typically-solid defense. The Hornets could not get a quality look and scored their last points on Jack's layup at the 3:19 mark. With Paul out, Jack played 43 minutes and backcourt mate Marco Belinelli played 44 minutes and the duo combined for 40 points to lead the New Orleans offense. Where Paul was missed was on pick-and-rolls and his ability to set up big men David West, Emeka Okafor and Carl Landry. New Orleans' interior trio combined for just 29 points on 11-of-32 shooting. The Hornets had just 10 assists on 29 field goals--the Bulls had 10 assists in the first quarter alone--and without Paul to create, New Orleans couldn't dent Chicago's vaunted interior defense down the stretch.

Rose's improved three-point shooting has fallen off lately. Since nearly all of his misses have been short, it's easy to point to tired legs except that in every other phase of the game, Rose has looked anything but fatigued. This suggests the issue is more mechanical than anything and it was a good sign that he broke through with a pair of bombs in the second half of Monday's game. The first trey snapped a string of 19 consecutive misses from behind the arc.

The Bulls simply aren't a great halfcourt offensive team right now and their offensive issues are exacerbated by the team's persistently slow pace. As well as the team is playing, this might seem like nitpicking, but as Thibodeau said before the game, "We have a number of things we need to clean up." Right now, Chicago is closing fast on Boston for the second spot in NBAPET's power rankings. This is a championship-contending team which means in that context, there is no nit to small to pick. When the Bulls struggle, it's almost always because of stagnant offense and an inability to get easy points. Pace plays a big part of that, according to Thibodeau, but Monday marked the sixth straight game in which the Bulls failed to reach even 90 possessions.

"I thought we were low-energy, to be honest," said Thibodeau. "I did think we had good energy on defense. I would have like to have seen us push the ball a little bit more, particularly late in the game. Sometimes I think if you slow it down late and get too conservative, you miss out on some easy baskets that you really need late in the game. I thought in the first half we were okay, but I thought in the second half we really walked it up way too much."

The Clipboard: Post-trade Knicks Getting Stops (by Sebastian Pruiti): Even ardent supporters of New York's acquisition of Carmelo Anthony acknowledged that he wouldn't help much on the defensive end. Guess what? So far, the Knicks' revamped roster is actually defending better since the deal.

The List: Last Regular-Season Edition (by John Perrotto): As the major conferences prepare for their postseason tournaments, the champion of the Atlantic Sun Conference makes an unlikely appearance on The List.

Strength in Numbers: Big East Tournament (by John Gasaway): You can't throw a stick at Madison Square Garden this week without hitting a flock of at-large teams. But who's going to hack their way through such a brutal bracket and win it all? In his feature for ESPN Insider, John makes his pick.

Recapping Sloan: Two Key Issues (by Kevin Pelton): During last weekend's fifth annual MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conferences, a pair of important questions came up. How do we predict what a player will be from what they've been? And does specific data tell us more than a larger, more general sample? (free)

Tuesday Truths: Final Reality (by John Gasaway): The regular season's in the books, so this week the Truths arrive a day early. Did we finally get some clarity on a wild season? Well, yes (Big Ten, SEC) and no (ACC, Pac-10). (free)

Dynamic Duos: Can Anthony and Stoudemire Work? (by Dan Feldman): A look at the history of high-scoring tandems suggests that the most successful combinations thrive thanks to their ability to contribute with rebounding and defense. That could spell trouble in the Big Apple for Carmelo Anthony and Amar'e Stoudemire. (free)

Tournament Preview: WCC Tournament (by Kevin Pelton): The West Coast Conference begins its tournament today in Las Vegas, but the real action starts when Gonzaga and St. Mary's start battling for spots in the NCAA Tournament. (premium)

Basketball Prospectus authors take your questions from time to time in always-popular chat format. All chats begin at 1 p.m. EST on the day listed (unless noted), but you can go in and submit a question beforehand if you like, or read the transcript after the fact.

GRIZZLIES 107, THUNDER 101 (box): Tony Allen and Mike Conley scored 20 points each to lead a balanced Memphis attack in which all five starters scored 12 points or more and the Grizzlies beat a top-four West team for the third time in their last four games.

MAVERICKS 108, TIMBERWOLVES 105 (box): Minnesota's Wayne Ellington missed a desperation half-court shot at the buzzer, giving Dallas the win in what was the 20th straight game the Mavericks have posted an Offensive Rating of 105.0 or better.

ROCKETS 123, KINGS 101 (box): Houston point guard Kyle Lowry put up 19 points, seven rebounds and eight assists and Chase Budinger scored 20 points as the Rockets put up their second-best Offensive Rating of the season and won for the seventh time in eight games.

GLOSSARY+/- (Plus-Minus) Raw data is from official box scores from NBA.com.GR (Game Rating) Reflects a player's Points Created total, or the portion of his team's offense for which he gets credit based on his box score line. This number is then adjusted for estimated defensive performance based on box score counterpart productivity. GR is pace-adjusted so you can compare players from game to game.PCP (Points Created Per Possession Used) An estimate of each player's points created per possession used, a measure of offensive efficiency. The stat accounts for a player's entire box score line, not just the scoring categories.PLY% (Play percentage) An estimate of the percentage of a team's possessions on which the player was on the court.USG An estimate of how many of those plays a player used by shooting, going to the line or committing a turnover, with a portion the team's offensive rebound total subtracted.TEAM STATS
PACE: Estimated possessions in the game.
ORTG: A team's points per 100 possessions.
eFG%: Team's shooting percentage with an extra half-point added for each made three-point field goal.
oRB%: Percentage of a team's misses that they retrieved off the offensive glass.
TO%: Percentage of a team's possessions resulting in a turnover.
FTA%: Percentage of a team's possessions resulting in a trip to the foul line.